News and notes from each week of NASCAR racing using a Las Vegas oddsmaking perspective

Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Kevin Harvick using impressive Bristol chassis this week at Dover

Kevin Harvick is 5/1 to win at Dover on Sunday

Kevin Harvick and the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet SS team will compete in the FedEx 400 Benefiting Autism Speaks NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) race at Dover (Delaware) International Speedway this weekend.

Testing… Harvick and the No. 4 Budweiser team are working on making both left and right turns at Virginia International Raceway in Alton, Virginia, this week in preparation for the two summer road-course events on the NSCS schedule. The test session was originally scheduled for Tuesday, but when rain hampered on-track activity, they extended the test to Wednesday.

Golfing for a Cause… Before getting on track in Dover this weekend, Harvick will participate in the 13th Annual Drive for Autism Celebrity-Am Golf Outing on Thursday at DuPont Country Club in Wilmington, Delaware. The event helps raise money and awareness for autism.

Autism Speaks… Harvick’s No. 4 Chevrolet will feature an Autism Speaks puzzle piece decal for Sunday’s race. Teams across all three of NASCAR’s national touring series will show their support for Autism Speaks this weekend by displaying the decal on their respective race vehicles at Dover.

Chassis Info…The No. 4 Budweiser team will utilize Chassis No. 846 in Sunday’s race. Harvick last raced this car at Bristol (Tennessee) Motor Speedway in March. He led 28 laps during that event and was running in the top five when something cut an oil line on the car, ending the team’s night. Harvick was credited with a 39th-place finish.

Dover Stats… Harvick has 26 prior NSCS starts at Dover. While he’s yet to visit Victory Lane at the track, he’s earned three top fives and 12 top 10s. He has an average start of 19.4 and an average finish of 15.2 at Dover.

Loop Data… Harvick owns a couple notable marks in NASCAR’s Loop Data scoring system at Dover heading into this weekend’s event, including: third in green flag passes (802 passes) and ninth in laps in top 15 (4,391 laps).

A Look Back… During last year’s FedEx 400, Harvick started 7th and finished 8th.

Salute… Now through August 15, beer drinkers can enter a code contained inside specially marked packages of Budweiser on Budweiser.com/donate to trigger a $1 donation to Folds of Honor, accounting for up to $1 million combined with wholesaler contributions for a more than $3 million total donation to Folds of Honor in 2014. Through scholarships and other assistance, Folds of Honor gives back to the families of soldiers killed or disabled in service to our country. Since first partnering with Folds of Honor Foundation in 2010, Budweiser and its wholesalers have raised nearly $10 million for military families, accounting for thousands of scholarships across the country.

Harvick on Racing at Dover International Speedway

Take us on a lap around Dover.“For me, Dover is one of those tracks where you feel the speed the most. You carry a lot of speed through the corners and as you go from the straightaways the elevation change as you go down in the corners is pretty drastic and then you’re right back in the throttle and it kind of throws you back out of that hole and up the hill on the exit of the corner. Laps seem to happen very fast there and you want to try and have the best handling race car you can have there, because if you’re off even a little bit you’ll go multiple laps down in a hurry. It’s a fun, very fast race track that’s really hard to get everything right.”

Talk a little bit about the physical demands on a driver at Dover. You always hear about how intense a lap around the track is, but 400 laps around there must really be taxing on a driver?“Dover is definitely one of the most taxing places that we go to for sure. There are just a lot of g-forces as you go off into the corner and it kind of throws you down into a hole. There’s a lot of banking with a lot of speed and it’s hard on your body. I usually leave out of there with sore heels from where my feet have beat on the floorboard through the day. It’s definitely a very taxing race track for a driver.”

What do you expect we’ll see with the new qualifying format at Dover? With it being such a narrow track, do you feel that this could be one of the hairier qualifying sessions?“I think at Dover every lap is fast, but for qualifying it’s one of those places where you have to put it right on the edge. I don’t know that you’ll see too many people go back out and run faster the second time, but it’ll definitely create some extra opportunities because in the past it’s been one of those hit or miss laps that you get with only one opportunity, but with the way the format is I think it will definitely open it up to having a second opportunity.”

Dover is one of only seven tracks the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series visits that you’re winless at. Talk about what it would mean to score a win there, and where that win would rank on your list.“I think in the past we have been either hit or miss at Dover and it’s just been one of those places I haven’t been able to get to Victory Lane in any series. I’ve been close a couple times in the different series, but to go there and finally conquer that particular track would definitely be a feather in the cap.”